Adsorption of tetracycline antibiotics using metal and clay embedded cross-linked chitosan

Abstract

To enhance the adsorption capacity of chitosan (Cht), which is an plenty of biopolymer, zirconium loaded chitosan (Zr/Cht) and zirconium loaded chitosan modified by perlite (Zr/Cht/Pt) composites were synthesized and adsorption capacities were compared with raw chitosan using tetracycline (TC) as the adsorbate. These adsorbates were used to study the TC elimination from aqueous solution by examining the effect of zirconium loading amount, pH, contact time and temperature. Temkin, Freundlich and Langmuir isotherm models were studied to determine the most suitable isotherm model for adsorption process. Langmuir isotherm model has been found as the most appropriate model. The maximum adsorption capacities were found as 4.24 mg g−1, 49.019 mg g−1 and 104.17 mg g−1 for Cht, Zr/Cht and Zr/Cht/Pt, respectively. Pseudo-second order model has been found appropriate, considering the correlation coefficients, for the TC adsorption. The synthesized composites were found as the high adsorption capacity for TC adsorption.